


Love Ya, See Ya, Bye

by fluffy_monsters



Category: Original Work
Genre: Angst With Hope, Gen, Mental Health Issues, Self-Discovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-27
Updated: 2016-04-27
Packaged: 2018-06-04 18:59:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,962
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6671005
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fluffy_monsters/pseuds/fluffy_monsters
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I used to be afraid Momma would kill me in my sleep. So I slept with the door open and my back to the door so I wouldn’t see it coming.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Love Ya, See Ya, Bye

_“I used to be afraid Momma would kill me in my sleep. So I slept with the door open and my back to the door so I wouldn’t see it coming.”_

_She takes a deep breath. She starts her car, a Toyota Corolla—highly dependable and a steal because her dad put the loan in his name. It’s a deep blue and she named it Oscar (she likes to give most all things names). She decides to send the text before she leaves her therapist’s parking lot. She was advised to be more honest with her loved ones. She had agreed to try. She knows once she leaves the parking lot the feelings of peace, safety and acceptance will seep out of her like honey out of a cracked jar. She has to do this at an emotional high, or she’d talk herself out of it._

_She looks down at her wrist, at the tattoo that tells her to be strong, to not let the past define her. She had the tattoo done the day before she moved back to her old hometown. Her family, who are conservative and deeply religious, hate it, but she finds it to be the one thing she loves about herself; it is a piece of a poem she heard when she was fifteen, but that stuck with her for many years. It is humorous to her, that the sole thing she likes herself for is innately artificial; however, she perversely finds joy in the irony. And there is always strength in laughter._

_Her eyes find send. Her thumb presses on the screen._

_She breathes, and decides to try to listen to music. She turns on Oscar’s player, and leaves the volume where it is. She can’t listen to the radio, that’s entirely stressful. She needs all her numbers to add up to something divisible by three (she knows she is crazy, hence the therapy). Volume stays at 27, (2+7=9; 9/3=3). She listens to Adele’s “21” album. Oddly enough and despite all the odds, her favorite song is track 11. She rarely allows herself to listen to it (she wishes it were conveniently track 12, if there was a track 12)._

_(Her birthdate adds up to 36 in the mm/dd/yyyy format. This is a relief.)_

_She’s driving down Ferry Road when she feels her phone buzz. She reminds herself that a boy died less than a year ago on this road because of bad driving and texting. She tells herself she can wait._

_Her anxiety builds; it’s entirely illogical. She is an adult, and capable of patience._

_Screw it._

_She pulls off the road into a stranger’s ditch. A dog eyes her warily, cautiously edging the length of his chain to sniff near her tires. She watches the dog for a moment. He’s tied to an old pecan tree, plenty of shade, two bowls that most likely hold both food and water. She sees a doghouse on the porch painted to look like a tiny barn, next to a black rocking chair and a hanging fern. She imagines a quaint doormat that says “Please Wipe Your Paws” in front of the front door._

_He is taken care of, yet she is sad for him._

_He is alone._

_She reminds herself that if he is this taken care of while outside, he probably has wonderful owners and is deeply loved. There is no need to save him. She looks back at the dog, which has crouched down, wary and waiting for her next move._

_He looks like a Jack Russell, mixed with something else she can’t identify. His tail looks like it’s been broken more than once—he has two hooks in it; it vaguely resembles a question mark. She wonders if the rocking chair played a part._

_He’s more brown than white, with large eyes that look like they want to devour the world. Or maybe he’s just hungry. Maybe there are two bowls of water on a hot June day like this._

_She wonders if the dog would like her (she wants everyone to like her). She takes a breath, and looks down._

_“Haha that’s awesome.”_

_She feels nothing, absolutely nothing, until all of a sudden her world shifts. Honey turns to water like water turned to wine._

_All of a sudden the taste of cheap coconut rum and Hawaiian Punch hit the back of her throat. It’s a memory, not anything she has tasted remotely recently, but it’s as strong as the night she first drank it (poor man’s wine). She blinks back tears and pulls onto the highway. The dog (she named him Chuck in her mind), finding courage at the vehicle’s retreat, begins to bark, but the high-pitched sound gradually fades as she picks up speed. She imagines her goodbye with Chuck._

_(It’s not the reaction she wanted, but somehow it’s exactly what she expected.)_  


She is twelve when her father leaves, taking her sister with him. There is no choice given, and in her heart she knows she will never have her family together again. She waves goodbye to them, but then starts chasing after the truck. She yells their customary goodbye—“LOVE YA, SEE YA, BYE!” (She thinks that started with her grandma, but she isn’t entirely sure.) Eventually, the truck pulls too far ahead for her even remotely to keep up, and she slows. She turns and begins the walk back to her house. Well her and Momma’s house. As she reaches the front door she pauses, sighs and walks inside. Her Momma is sick again. She needs to get Momma to take her medicine, and assuming she keeps it down she will crack open a can of Campbell’s and heat it up. As she brings Momma the medicine, Momma looks up at her, misery and tears on her face, “Thank you, for staying. You’re the only one that loves me. What a good girl.” 

__She sees her sister at school. She tries to talk to her exactly once. She sees her father in the grocery store. Momma sent her with a list. He meets her eyes, turns and walks down another aisle. Something twists, sour, angry and hot in her stomach. She hopes her face doesn’t reflect what she feels._ _

__She spends the next year convincing Momma that they need to move. They need a new start. Somewhere. Anywhere. Momma looks at her intently. “Sweetheart, what are you going to do after I die? You know the doctor said either the pain or the medication will kill me.”_ _

__The shock is an exquisite punch to the gut._ _

__Momma even gives her a timeline—five years. She feels too much, is overwhelmed by the significance of a timeline; it’s the first time she has really understood the meaning of loss. She feels incredibly stupid._ _

__She wonders if the doctor really said that, or if Momma just believes it. Either way, it is Momma’s truth. She swallows. “I’ll deal with that when I have to.”_ _

__Momma sneers (Momma wanted tears and anguish, not a resolve to ignore—she realizes this too late to correct it), face going from slightly sad and nostalgic to bitter and hate-filled in half a heartbeat. “You’ll go running back to him. You’ll sell out the minute he offers to take you on a trip, or help you get a car. My God, you even wanted to help paint the room you supposedly share with your sister. Just leave and live with him now! Everyone leaves! Just go away!” Momma’s voice turns to scorn, “Love you, see you, bye! Isn’t that right?”_ _

__The bedroom door slams, shaking with her Momma’s force._ _

__She feels tired. She has homework. She goes to the living room, one lone couch the only furniture left since her father took the rest. He has a new house, a new life._ _

__She sleeps._ _

__They move west. No one bothers telling them goodbye._ _

__Later in her life, somewhere between confusing adolescence and a more confusing adulthood, she wakes up and realizes she is a mother to her Momma, without any of the freedom or respect associated with being a responsible adult. She accepts this, because nothing ever changes, especially not Momma._ _

__She attends college—has a scholarship, in fact. Tuition and fees paid because of hard work, a good GPA and a great ACT score. Every day before she leaves for class she tells Momma “Love ya, See ya, Bye!” It’s a promise that she’ll come home._ _

__She works two part-time jobs. One is to pay the necessary bills—medication, the near-weekly E.R. visits—and one job is for the everyday—rent, cable so Momma isn’t bored, food, and the excess Momma needs to order off the Home Shopping Network each night. Momma has become a nocturnal recluse. She sleeps during the day. She orders at night. Every once in a while Momma has to be forced to go to the doctor. Momma hates it because she has to leave the apartment._ _

__Before one appointment, when Momma refuses to go—even though the appointment had already been rescheduled twice, and the doctor wouldn’t see Momma anymore if Momma cancelled again—she gets angry. “Momma, go to this appointment or I’ll change the pin number and security question to my debit card.” Momma looks at her, shocked and appalled._ _

__“Yes, Massa.” Momma bows her head as she says it (she is no Harriet Beecher Stowe), an ugly look on Momma’s face. She thinks it looks like hate. Momma goes to the doctor. This does not feel like a victory._ _

__Regardless of what the doctor or dosages say, Momma never takes her prescriptions right. Momma will not take any medicine for at least two days, if not three, so that when Momma takes 3 dosages of a cocktail of Methadone, Diazepam, Dilauded or Lyrica (among others) it knocks Momma out for at least 24 hours._ _

__She always knows when Momma has taken the Lyrica. Lyrica is the only medicine that makes Momma slur her words._ _

__She is still Momma’s daughter, and while she is resigned to the way Momma functions, she feels incredible guilt when she is forced to check her Mother to see if she is still breathing. It is a personal failure of the highest degree to have to hold her hand up to Momma’s nose to feel the movement of air, because Momma’s chest doesn’t seem to be moving to the naked eye (she thought this was normal behavior for years, until a friend who doesn’t scare easily laughs at her when she checks for Momma’s breath)._ _

__Something ugly, nameless and vicious twists in her gut when she feels the small puff of air one rainy day after work. The closest feeling she can describe it as being akin to is regret. She pulls her hand away slowly. She goes to the bathroom, leaving Momma sleeping off the high on the floor where she passed out (Momma will be mad when Momma wakes and she left Momma on the floor). She turns on the hot water, as hot as it will go. When it’s half full she climbs in, clothes and all, and bites her hand to keep from screaming. She doesn’t turn the water off till it gently laps at the edge of the tub. There is steam in the air. There is blood in her teeth and on her hand. She tastes copper and bile. This is her life, and she will accept it. She will not break, and she will not leave. She will not fail._ _

__Time passes. Not quickly, and not quietly. Momma says she is distant. Momma says this makes Momma lonely. The situation makes Momma a calm kind of angry. “Do you love me anymore sweetheart? Do you love me like I love you? Or are you going to leave me too?”_ _

__It is a daily, if not hourly, task to reassure Momma that she isn’t leaving—that she has stayed this long, that Momma is a good Mother and doesn’t deserve the life Momma has been given. That Momma is loved, wanted and needed. Momma never seems to believe it, but wants to hear it regardless._ _

__One day she asks permission to go with a friend to her friend’s house; it’s a party, but Momma doesn’t need to know that. She is beginning to feel rebellious for the first time that she can remember. She still feels guilt, but she will confess and seek forgiveness from Momma later. As long as she does nothing to make Momma look bad, Momma will care little._ _

__(But God forbid she step over a boundary in public she hasn’t known existed, a line she has never seen but that her Dad could find out about and judge Momma for—unforgivable. She once tried to call her sister—with momma’s permission—and got voicemail. Momma got mad because Momma said “That voicemail couldn’t sound more depressed! Thanks for making your dad think I’m a depressing parent! My God he is going to have a field day playing that message to his friends!” She didn’t try calling her sister again for two years.)_ _

__(Absolution is impossible; it is a hard lesson learned.)_ _

__Momma says no, that she cannot visit her friend. She is twenty-two years old. Something in her gut snaps, cold and deadly._ _

__“When are you going to start treating me like an adult, Momma?! When will I be your equal?! I think by now I deserve that!” She means to say it calmly, almost in a whisper. Momma doesn’t respond well to strong emotion._ _

__She screams it._ _

__Momma looks at her, disgusted. Momma speaks softly, Momma’s voice at its most eloquent and soothing. “You’ll never by my equal.”_ _

__And for the first time in over ten years, she sees Momma truly smile._ _

__She looks at Momma, uncomprehending, before turning and walking back into her room. She sits on her bed. She thinks. Or possibly she doesn’t think of anything at all._ _

__Eventually, she hears the sound of glass shattering. She feels disconnected and uncaring, but decides to investigate. She worries about eventually getting the deposit back on the apartment._ _

__Momma is in the kitchen. She is calmly throwing the glass cups into the sink, where they make a sound like a wind chime when they shatter. The glasses themselves are cheaply made and even cheaper to buy. She is surprised they shatter with such grace. Momma isn’t looking at her, but does arc another glass in the sink._ _

__She makes a decision. “There’s lasagna in the freezer if you get hungry. Cut a slit in the plastic and heat at 450 degrees for 45 minutes, and then take the plastic off the top and cook for another 10 minutes. Please use the oven mitt.” She walks out the door. She wonders when she gets home, how much glass she will have to clean up. (Momma yells at her as she leaves, “I don’t need you to fucking tell me how to feed myself! I don’t NEED you, you selfish bitch!”)_ _

__She is not at her best that night at her friend’s home. She thinks she could love her friend, this woman who doesn’t judge her for anything, who doesn’t care if she screws up at school, work or home. This amazing human being who acts like a best friend from the minute they meet._ _

__She wants someone who loves her back. She thinks perhaps this friend does. She wants her friend, feels the first tendrils of desire in a way she never has anyone before this night. She has no idea how to cope with this feeling. She is overwhelmed and underprepared._ _

__She chooses a response badly._ _

__She has never tasted alcohol, has never had the time or the inclination (Sunday school and Momma taught her well). She discovers alcohol and drunkenness that same night. She loves the taste of coconut rum and Hawaiian Punch, and as far as she knows sticks with it until she is too wasted to notice, taste or smell what is going down her throat._ _

__She has never had sex. She discovers that losing virginity is anticlimactic and vaguely painful in the faraway place to which her mind has retreated. She won’t remember everything, but she will remember being on the living room floor, close enough to the stairs that her head hit the bottom step with each clumsy thrust. She won’t remember an ending, of any kind._ _

__She wakes up the next morning with a hangover that rivals any sickness she has ever known. She is on the floor of an empty bedroom in her friend’s home. The bedroom will soon be painted a pale pink and yellow for the daughter of her friend, though she does not know this at the time. For now there is a sleeping bag and an empty glass—water or rum, she doesn’t remember. She is far too sick to chance checking._ _

__She wanders downstairs to the kitchen. She is disconnected. She doesn’t understand what she has done. She knows far too well what she has done. She has never felt such dread, such an all-consuming remorse._ _

__Her friend is facing away from her. Her friend stares with an overcompensation of attention at the frying pan as the eggs cook for breakfast (her friend tried to teach her how to cook a roast once—they ended up ordering pizza and laughing at a Monty Python on the blue-ray player). Finally, her friend speaks, but will not turn to look at her. “Philip is going to drive you to school, so you aren’t late. It’s probably for the best if you don’t come here again.”_ _

__She chokes on air or bile, she’s not sure which._ _

__This is heartbreak._ _

__“Love you, see you, bye” is more empty air than a true whisper that passes her lips._ _

__Her friend’s husband drives her as far as the library at school. There, he parks and idles the engine. The angry purr reverberates throughout the cabin of the truck; it’s a jacked four-door Chevy, silver paint and rust fighting for dominance. She humorously thinks of it as the “penis extension”._ _

__Or, used to she did. Now the thought makes her gag in the silence._ _

__Finally, he speaks._ _

__“Listen, I’m sorry about last night. I was really drunk, and I know you were too. Sam will get over it. Just give her some time.” She doesn’t want to hear about this blatant dismissal of her friend’s hurt, of blatant mistreatment of the only person she has ever loved and who has possibly ever loved her in return._ _

__Especially as she is the cause of her friend’s pain. She gets out of the truck. “I’m so sorry,” she whispers before her feet hit the ground. She doesn’t know if he heard her, but she doesn’t turn to check or wait for his reply. She moves forward._ _

__She walks to class. The History of Art Before the 1500’s. She buys the biggest coffee she can find in the library cafeteria (old and burnt, a small but deserved punishment) and sits in the front row. She forces herself to pay attention. She forces down all of the coffee, even after it has become tepid sludge. She dutifully writes notes on “The Four Tetrarchs” and the different yet dissonantly similar Triumphs that dot Europe. She concentrates more than is required during the discussion about the “Death Mask of Agamemnon” and the “Bull-Leaping Fresco” at Knossos._ _

__(She ignores how it hurts to sit, how she has to slouch sideways to compensate for this new and unique ache.)_ _

__After class, as she walks to work, she wonders how she became a person she hates._ _

__(She potentially destroyed a family. She has hurt whom she loves, in the most poignant and cruel manner possible.)_ _

__At work she mindlessly rings up customers at checkout. Cucumbers are coded 4062. Tomatoes are 3151. Lettuce is 4061. Roma tomatoes are 4087. Bananas are 4011. Celery is 4070. Zucchini is 4067. Jalapenos are 4063. Green Bell Peppers are 4065. Avocados are 4046. Oranges are 4013. Limes (large) are 4048. Green Cabbage is 4069—Red is 4554. She has to look up Yuca Root, 4819; it breaks the pattern and throws her off. The goal is not to pay attention, to lose herself in the monotony._ _

__She idly chats with uninterested coworkers during her required breaks. She acts normal. She tries to breathe. She does this for hours._ _

__Suddenly, the coffee that is the only thing she has managed to consume that day decides to rise up in her gorge, choking her with its bitterness. She drops to her knees as she tries not to gag, apologizing to the customer after a deep breath in and out. The customer, an older and possibly sympathetic grandmother, clucks her tongue and tells her she needs to be at home resting if she has the stomach flu. She can’t tell if this is concern or disgruntlement at the thought of catching the supposed virus. She doesn’t care, but she does apologize again._ _

__Her boss has made her way over, apologizes for her, and dismisses her for the day._ _

__“You don’t look good,” is all her boss says to her. She passively agrees, and comments that she doesn’t feel good either. She begins walking home. It’s a half hour walk or a five minute bus ride, assuming it’s during the period of the day that the buses run. The buses are running, but she does not begin the walk to the bus stop. She turns instead and heads straight for home._ _

__It is cold, and she can taste snow on the tip of her tongue, mingling with the breath of every exhale._ _

__She walks. She thinks. Of Momma. Of her friend. Of what she has done. Of whom she has become. She doesn’t like herself at all. She has betrayed everyone close to her._ _

__She feels immensely alone, like she is the lone being on a planet of trash. She feels an affinity for Wall-E, despite her near panic attack the first time she watched the Disney film. Wall-E, ever in solitude, runs over his lone cockroach pet and thinks he has killed it. She does not feel the relief Wall-E displays when the cockroach pops back up and cocks his antennae as if to say “All better!” She wonders at such a foreign concept—relief._ _

__Still, the movie resonates with her. The lone survivor of a destroyed home, endlessly spiraling in a galaxy filled with nothing but space (and perhaps one day, a friend)._ _

__She wonders if anyone in the world would care that her life is spiraling, and that she has lost her way._ _

__Purpose, responsibility and reason are Momma._ _

__Her friend, Samantha, was love and desire, and is now ultimately anguish._ _

__Philip has become shame and regret._ _

__This is what she knows in her heart._ _

__She reaches the bridge that crosses over the railroad tracks. The trains run at 4am and 4pm. She hears the train from her apartment. The 4am train wakes her on the mornings she works at 5am. She is out the door by 4:30 because the buses don’t run that early._ _

__She jaywalks into the back of an apartment complex for single students. It’s in front of her “family-oriented” apartment complex._ _

__She wonders if she should become a train-hopper (she hates the term hobo, it sounds so offensively, humorously cartoonish for true people). Train-hoppers have a sense of freedom along with hardship and sadness, which is more than she can say for herself._ _

__She smiles. If only it were that simple. She has responsibilities. Besides, she loves her phone, internet and cable. Her tastes run much too rich for the fluid and basic lifestyle; it’s a fairytale._ _

__She has no such options._ _

__She pauses, standing still on the ice and salt-crusted sidewalk between the two complexes._ _

__She wonders._ _

__She pulls her phone from her pocket, and dials a number from a lifetime ago. She wonders if the number is even the same._ _

__There is an answer. “Hello?”_ _

__She clears her throat. “Is…is this Richard?”_ _

__“Yeah, who is this?”_ _

__“Dad, it’s me.”_ _

__He throws her a party she doesn’t want. Her sister hugs her. She tries her best to hug back. Her dad tells everyone at work and church, “The Prodigal Daughter returns!” She acknowledges this responsibility—another that probably isn’t really hers, but that she’ll take anyway. She’s used to trying to take on things that aren’t hers. Besides, he smiles when he looks at her, and she thinks he means it. She’ll take on the world for a reaction like that._ _

__She smiles when, during the party, dad tells her how much he missed her. How much he always wished he could help her._ _

__She thinks of the moment he saw her in a store and walked away, and her stomach twists with the memory. She remembers how he left, how he took her family, how he gave her a new life as caretaker to a woman incapable of love, and never looked back. Of how he forewent his responsibility, and handed it over to her instead._ _

__She looks at her dad, so earnest, and she remembers the day she was trying to tell Momma she was leaving, too. She remembers Momma begging, “Baby, please no!”_ _

__Anger would have been easier._ _

__She remembers calling her sister, sobbing loudly, and her sister involuntarily committing her Mother, a danger to herself and others. She was used to Momma’s threats, but that time was the first she was scared Momma would follow through. She was physically incapable of doing anything about it though—this began with her betrayal. Another knife in the back of her mother was inconceivable. She was Marcus Brutus in this epic, despite all her effort to stay true to her path, to remain steadfast and strong in her convictions, to maintain value in her principles._ _

__Et tu Brute?_ _

__Eventually, Momma was declared healthy enough and admitted into an assisted living._ _

__Momma begged her not to leave Momma there, not to do this, not to abandon Momma to this life. When she doesn’t respond to Momma (her eyes on the floor) Momma’s mood twists. “This is abuse. You’ve always been selfish. You’re really his daughter, aren’t you?” Momma pauses, cocks her head, then giggled—mouth twisted into a parody of a grin. She felt terror at the sound. “You’re just like the rest of them. Leave! Get Out! I can’t stand to look at you!”_ _

__She came back at a later date and remembers trying to say goodbye, the usual phrase caught in her throat—she loved Momma, she didn’t know when (or if) she’d see Momma again, it was really Goodbye; it didn’t matter, Momma wouldn’t speak to her (she sends Momma money each month so that Momma can order from the Home Shopping Network anyway)._ _

__Momma had screamed that Momma hated her that day, a few days before she moved. (The next week Momma called and asked if she had a first boyfriend yet. Momma just wanted to chat and catch up, Momma said. Momma also mentioned how Momma is learning to cope with a broken heart, and that Momma refuses to swallow any hurt any more.)_ _

__The change in sentimentality is normal, and easy enough to navigate at least. Act like nothing happened. Swallow the hurt, and muddle through, and eventually Momma will like her again. At least until she gets mad again, which could be in an hour, a week or a day. The only guarantee with Momma is that she will get mad again._ _

__Someone’s laughter pulls her from her thoughts. She smiles at her dad, and tells him she missed him too._ _

__Time passes. Someone, eventually, suggests therapy after one too many panic attacks, stomach aches, sleepless nights and sleep-filled days. She makes an appointment at an office, three towns over. In the therapist’s office, there are options on where to sit. She sits on a tasteful, threadbare but comfortable cloth couch (facing the door), feet pulled up underneath her, tapping her fingers and bouncing her knee (repetitions of three), waiting for the therapist._ _

__The therapist walks in and softly closes the door. The Prodigal Daughter feels her mouth open, words spilling out, wishing she had the strength to shove them back in. “I had to leave! I left because I was afraid I was going to snap, and I would kill her. I was going to kill my Mother! What kind of person thinks that? What kind of person hopes to come home and find their mother dead? Do you have any idea how much I hate myself?” She has never felt such absolute shame in her life._ _

__The therapist sits. The therapist does not try to shake her hand, for which she is grateful. She rarely likes to be touched. The therapist smiles softly. “I’m Katie. What’s your name?”_ _

__She pauses. She takes a breath (she checks the smile of the therapist for teeth). She remembers momma calling her ugly, immature, selfish, gorgeous, sweetheart, lovely, and hateful. She remembers momma calling her “my best friend” and “my baby girl” and “my heart.” She remembers her father not calling her anything for over a decade, and the Bible, and God._ _

__“Ava. I’m Ava.”_ _

_Later that day, she texts her sister back. “Yeah, fucking fantastic.”_

_She takes a deep breath, and moves forward.._

> What though the radiance
> 
> which was once so bright
> 
> Be now for ever taken from my sight,
> 
> Though nothing can bring back the hour
> 
> Of splendor in the grass,
> 
> of glory in the flower, 
> 
> We will grieve not, rather find 
> 
> Strength in what remains behind;
> 
> \--William Wordsworth
>
>>  
>> 
>>  


End file.
